Page 226 - Week 01 - Thursday, 11 February 2016
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easier for itself. We have seen this approach time and time again. The government did not like the planning rules when it came to the secure mental health facility, development at UC or the light rail project, so it changed them. In every case, the planning rules have been swept aside to allow the government to do what it likes. This is unacceptable. By definition, this is not planning policy. It is inappropriate for the government to constantly change the rules for themselves. People want certainty in the planning system. They want to know what the rules are and that they are consistent. We owe that to all Canberrans. We owe that to the neighbourhoods of Canberra.
Another inconsistency in this variation is the fact that only blocks purchased by the government can be unit titled. Home owners and developers are not able to do the same thing. This means that home owners are basically forced to sign up for the government’s scheme.
Variation 343 has nothing to do with good planning for the ACT. It is all about revenue raising. It is all about the government making money from the Mr Fluffy blocks. However, the government does not even know how much money the rezoning will actually raise. It is possible that subdividing Mr Fluffy blocks will actually raise less revenue for the government than selling them complete, but the government cannot tell us because it does not know, despite repeated questions. You would really expect that a competent government, with a spot rezoning policy like this, would have properly costed the buyback program, and that the sale value for blocks would form part of that costing. But that is not the case with this government.
Variation 343 also has the potential to lead to problems of negative equity. The government assumes that Mr Fluffy blocks will sell for a premium when they are rezoned for dual occupancy. However, if the government decides to rezone surrounding properties in the future, the premium paid for these blocks could very well be eroded. Therefore people buying into these blocks, perhaps deliberately so for the additional rights of dual occupancies, may have that eroded if, down the track, everybody else is afforded that same opportunity.
Variation 343 is random. The government is rezoning a number of blocks but there is no planning rationale for the rezoning. This is a terrible precedent to set. If the government wants to allow dual occupancy on these blocks just because they are Mr Fluffy blocks then it should properly rezone them, and not continue to claim that they are RZ1 when they have extra rights—RZ1-plus or RZ1 2.0. This would provide more certainty to the community, at least in terms of what rights are actually afforded to these blocks in the future.
The personal circumstances of one former Mr Fluffy owner were published in the paper just last week. The story of Christina Pilkington and her three-bedroom Ainslie home was reported in the Canberra Times. The story reads:
Christina Pilkington said she was paid $735,000 for her Chisholm Street home in October 2014 under the Fluffy buyback. Now the house has been demolished, the government has offered her the land back, still with a garage and asbestos- contaminated shed on site, for $725,000.
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